Accusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi of “sleeping at the wheel”, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday attacked the government over its handling of the economy and the coronavirus outbreak.
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On a day the stock markets in India tanked, addressing a press conference, Mr. Gandhi said “it is just the beginning of a tsunami and things are going to get much worse”.
“We can see what is happening to the stock market. The economy has been destroyed by Mr. Modi’s ideology and his policies,” he told reporters outside the Parliament House.
‘Buffer is gone’
The former Congress president said that a flawed demonetisation policy destroyed India’s informal economy and millions of the citizens continued to suffer. “In 2008, there was a shock wave similar to this, but the Indian economy was protected by our policies. Everybody was saying that Europe and the U.S. are decimated but our policies protected India. Let me tell you that the informal economy protected India at that point. The money that people had kept in their houses protected India at that point. With demonetisation, you have taken that buffer out, you have taken that shock absorber out. Now, you are going to face the full shock that you didn’t face in 2008,” he said.
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Objecting to the State Bank of India rescuing Yes Bank, a private sector bank, Mr. Gandhi said Mr. Modi should speak on the state of the economy. “The Prime Minister should explain to this country what he thinks is the strategy out of this mess. There are ways out of this mess but we are not hearing any of them,” Mr. Gandhi said.
The Congress leader said coronavirus was seriously affecting the economy and though it was already too late, the government should take measures to minimise damage.
“Coronavirus is a very very serious problem for our economy. It is a direct attack on the economy, so we have to start taking emergency measures now,”he said.
